Chapter 139 - The Escalation

"How do you mean not a single one?" Gabriel says incredulously.

"I meant exactly that," Mrs. Gomez says. "No one from The Residence staff was compatible enough to be a donor."

"Alright," Gabriel mutters. If this were a simple thing, he would have called up his mom or his relatives—the Tans are quite a big clan, although his relatives only gave them recognition as they went up the social ladder. But the circumstances surrounding Miguel's situation can be seen as scandalous, and their reputation could be damaged.

"And we can't ask your relatives or friends because of the sėnsɨtɨvė nature of this issue, correct, Sir?" Mrs. Gomez says, reading his mind.

"Yes," he says. "I'm afraid so."

"At one point we'd have to call up your mother, Mr. Tan."

"I'm very much afraid so," Gabriel says, glancing at Claire. "Although if possible, we should do some damage control. We'll try the office first. Maybe you can say something along the lines of 'a handsome reward awaits those who becomes a qualified donor'. But please, don't say it too bluntly like that. I don't want them to feel like I'm bribing them to help out."

"I understand," Mrs. Gomez says, the gears of her mind crunching. "I can go there, right away. I will—"

"I'll call up Catherine from public relations," Claire buŧŧs in. "Tell her to plug up any information leak about what happened. Control the media as much as possible. What do you think, Gab?"

Gabriel gazes at Claire, mild surprise in his face. "That's brilliant. But word must have leaked out by now. Maybe they're writing the story, or probably posting it on social media. What if we're already past the chance of correcting this or denying it ever happened?"

"Then we spin it in another direction," Claire says. "We'll call it an 'unthinkable accident', totally unforeseen. We should seed this version of events proactively."

Mrs. Gomez looks at her. "That actually makes sense. So just to be clear, we have two urgent problems here: Miguel's health and welfare and the blood we need right now, plus the story that revolves around this, knowing that the Tans are public personalities."

"Yes, exactly," Claire says. "We need to handle this more strategically. I'm sorry to be so calculative, but we're running out of time."

"That's quite a revelation, Claire," Gabriel says. The truth is, he's been waiting for the "real Claire" to come out for a long time; the Claire who had made men fall on their knees on the debate stage back in college, if her background was any useful reference. "Thank you so much."

She smiles. She wants to say, I'd be more vigilant and aggressive, moving forward. But she doesn't want to say that in front of Mrs. Gomez; for some reason, she still feels a bit awkward in front of her.

"You're quite right about the running out of time bit," Mrs. Gomez says, standing up. I'd better be going, then. Time is critical, so I'd need to be doing this fast. You take care of yourselves here, Mr. Tan, Claire. I'll be back."

On her mind, Mrs. Gomez thinks it will only take her a few minutes to get to the office. But in the real world, with her not bringing a car and not having asked the services of one of Mr. Tan's chauffeurs, she discovers to her dismay that flagging a cab in this part of town at this hour could be challenging. She's been standing by the side of the road in front of the hospital for what seems like a long time, and yet, no sight of a cab.

Annoyed and under mounting pressure, she rifles through her bag for her phone. She begins to tap on the number of her husband—he should be awake by now, for Pete's sakes—to bring over their car, when a Benz sedan stops right in front of her. Dean comes out and quickly opens the door for her. "Hop in, Ma'am!"

"My goodness, you're a sight for sore eyes. Thank God you're here," she exclaims.

"Miss Claire called me up," Dean says. "I had been waiting by the curb for a few hours, just for this kind of emergency."

"Yes, thank you," Mrs. Gomez says. She takes mental note of this: how Claire seems to be doing what she can to help everybody. "I ȧssume you already know the destination."

"Yes, Ma'am," Dean says. "And I also know we need to be there as fast as we could." Then he floors it; the Benz's powerful engine roars as they begin zipping on the main avenue, on the way to the TXCI building. Dean drives so fast that Mrs. Gomez is grabbing at anything to brace up herself.

"I also ȧssume you know we're not supposed to die in a car crash, Dean!" Mrs. Gomez's voice is hoarse from fear.

"Don't worry, Ma'am," Dean says coolly, clearly enjoying this. He rarely gets an order to "freaking get there as fast as you can," so this is a rare pŀėȧsurė, to be able to test the car's limits.

Meanwhile, Gabriel is speaking with Miguel's medical team, which gives Claire the chance to do her own work. She's calling up Gabriel's head of public relations department, Catherine Buenavista, whom she met only a few days ago. She tries Catherine's office phone, but it only rings and rings. She realizes she doesn't have Catherine's personal number. She thinks of asking Gabriel, but that would make her appear incompetent or flaky. She tries calling up the office receptionist, then on the third ring, she realizes Mrs. Gomez is ALSO the office receptionist, and she's on the road, on the way there. Why Gabriel hasn't promoted her to a more managerial position is beyond her understanding; maybe there's something to it than meets the eye. She makes mental note of that fact, promising herself to return to the matter when things have cooled down.

She stands up and waits; maybe she should give Catherine Buenavista a few more minutes. Perhaps she's stuck in traffic. But what if, of all the days of the week, she's on leave today? Claire closes her eyes and pinches the bridge of her nose, trying to stamp out an oncoming headache. When she next opens her eyes, she almost jumps in surprise: a man is standing in front of her, smiling. What in hell?

"Hello, Claire Monteverde, we meet again. And perhaps not in the most affable circumstances."

Claire's brow knits in confusion. "Do I know you?"

The man's lopsided grin, those beady little eyes, the unbearable moustache. There's something about this face that's so strikingly familiar.

"What?" the man says. "Just a few weeks into your high-fantasy whirlwind romance, and already you forget about me?"

"I really don't…" then in the same instance recognition comes, fear also chokes her. "You're that guy from—"

"That famous magazine, yes," the man says, laughing, looking around. He looks as if he hasn't yet slept, like somebody dragged him out of bed that early morning and planted him in this spot. He turns to her, still with that grin. "How can you forget the events of that pool party? Remember you had the sėxiest catfight in the pool with none other than Gabriel tan's ex, Michelle?" He extends a hand. "Gary Smulder, Muckraker magazine. At your service."